


The Renegade: Krogan Wisdom

by wonderwhatthisbuttondoes



Series: The Renegade [2]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Angst with a Happy Ending, Epic Friendship, Established Relationship, M/M, Mpreg, Omega Verse, Separations, Spectre Kaidan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-20
Updated: 2013-12-20
Packaged: 2018-01-05 06:43:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1090836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wonderwhatthisbuttondoes/pseuds/wonderwhatthisbuttondoes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four years on from the end of the Reaper war, Shepard and Kaidan are still together, the council's first and only Alpha/Omega Spectre team.  They wanted kids in the beginning (aside from Grunt) but that just didn't happen for them, so they're learning to live with it.  Now if only the rest of the galaxy would quit bringing it up, that would be great...</p><p>Also a Spectre mission, Rachni politics, unhelpfully clever Salarians, and a Krogan roadtrip.  Kegger.  Ritual.  Thing.<br/>Enjoy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Stowaway

Shepard blew through the outer doors of the council chambers, and just kept walking. His face was set in stone, unreadable, but something about the way the the man was moving cleared a path through the crowded hallway anyway. Shepard ducked around a Keeper that was conducting repairs on a portion of the ceiling up ahead, and stalked on.  
Gangs of workmen were everywhere on the Citadel now, nearly every race, like a new kind of ambassador. Maybe they were. Some of the workers had been part of the Crucible construction team, others were new, sent in as they could be spared from the reconstruction going on on their own homeworlds and colonies, but they all shared a common purpose- -to get the galactic center of commerce and government back up and running at full strength as soon as possible.  
Four years on from the end of the Reaper war, Trade at least was in full swing. So was barter, haggling, swindling, theft, the black-market, and outright piracy. Between that and the aggressive reshuffling of territory that was going on as it became clear how many of thousands of each race had survived, the council’s Spectres had been kept very busy.  
Shepard was officially on leave now, and he was pissed as hell.

-

“Spectre Alenko, do you have any idea where Shepard is?” the Salarian councilor asked.  
Kaidan paused momentarily, trying to gauge the feeling in the council chamber, and guess whether the question had been a rhetorical one.  
“He’s visiting a friend off-station, why?”  
“Do you know where he is, EXACTLY?” the Salerian pressed, steepling her fingers.  
“No I don’t, but I trust him,” Kaidan replied, “-may I ask what this is about, Councilor?”  
“We have received reports that Shepard is travelling with the Krantt of Urdnot Wrex, aboard a Krogan warship.”  
“That’s correct.”  
The Turian councilor folded his arms, and the Dalitress exchanged a look with the Asari councilor on her right.  
“We understand the two of you completed a human heat cycle recently, and that reproduction can be… difficult for your species,” the Asari began, “-it was thought that-”  
“Madame councilor,” Kaidan cut her off, as politely as he could stand to, “-Shepard is my husband, not yours. Yes, we had hopes early on, and I appreciate the consideration the council showed for us then, but…” he paused, and rubbed his forehead with one hand, “-look, this just isn’t in the cards for us, and by putting Shepard on the spot every time it happens ...you’re only making this worse.”  
“I see. I… am sorry, Spectre.”  
“So am I,” Kaidan admitted, “-now… you said something about a mission…?”

-

Sliding hard in the loose volcanic gravel, Shepard got off two more shots, and vanished behind the cover of an outcropping of boulders to let his weapon cool down. The Thresher maw vanished as well, slithering quickly underground. Ever watchful, the Krogans regrouped. The maw came up in their midst this time, and the hunting party turned on it with extreme ferocity. Three Krogans were left smouldering with acid, and the maw retreated again. Shepard shouldered his combine, and began climbing up the back of the second-largest boulder for a better firing position. At the top, he switched to his grenade launcher and waited. The ground rumbled warningly, and then all fell silent. The Maw came up, spat acid, and took fire. Shepard hit it in the back of the neck with two grenades, and it corkscrewed out of sight underground, screaming in a way that made the base of his skull hurt.  
Shepard counted back from ten in his head. At two, the gravel in front of the boulders exploded, and the Maw arched back, tentacles spread wide. Shepard shot it twice on the arc, and then dropped straight down off the back of the boulder, armored fingers catching an angle of the rock as the Maw scraped angrily over the crest and down into the ground again. Shepard let out the breath he’d been holding, and climbed the rest of the way down.

-

The Rachni were waiting for him, a squad of six soldiers and one brood warrior. Kaidan approached the above-ground entrance to their nest stiffly, and signalled for the marines behind him to keep their weapons down.  
Two Rachni soldiers flanked them. Kaidan’s hands were empty, but as everyone including the Rachni they were here to see knew, that didn’t mean he was any less dangerous.  
The brood warrior came forward with a clicking of chitinous claws, and stopped in front of Kaidan, his head swaying a little. The four glowing eyes on each side of the Rachni’s head met Kaidan’s two. Kaidan allowed his eyes to glow back.  
“I’m Major Kaidan Alenko, a Spectre from the council. I was sent here to speak with your queen, at her request,” he said. The brood-warrior shuffled his feet, and waved the tentacles on his back a little. Neither had a damned clue what the other was saying. Kaidan turned his head slightly to one side, and waited, betting that any Rachni sent out to parlay with them would be intelligent enough to realize this also.  
He was.  
The brood warrior stopped waving his tentacles, and seemed to sit back on his four hind feet for a moment, considering. Then he walked around Kaidan’s group, attempting to cut the biotic human out from the others. Kaidan put a hand on the shoulder of the Asari commando/translator beside him and ordered,  
“Everyone else, take a step back.”  
The brood warrior got up very close, eyeing the Asari critically. She stood her ground, and Kaidan’s hand stayed on her shoulder. The brood warrior finished his inspection of them, and shuffled unhurriedly back. Four of the Rachni soldiers kept an eye on the marines, and the two who had been ordered to flank stayed in position. Kaidan didn’t like it, but he couldn’t blame the alien for using erring on the side of caution in his own home.  
The brood warrior raised his head, and then leaned his body in the direction of the nest entrance. He took a few clicking sideways steps, and looked back to see if Kaidan and the Asari would follow.  
“I understand,” Kaidan nodded once, and they went underground.

-

The Krogan ship forged on through the night, her FTL drive a low, ponderous humm. Shepard saved the message he’d been writing, and put the datapad down, sliding his boots off the large crate he’d taken to using for a desk. He’d been feeling ‘off’ ever since that last FTL jump, and as he stood, the sensation resolved itself into into a small but sharp pain, deep down in his stomach. He knew what this was. Knew what his body was about to refuse him _again_ some time that night, and the knowledge felt like beginning a free-fall.  
Shepard reached up, and put both hands on the thick pipe that ran across the small cabin’s ceiling. He shut his eyes, jaw set tight, and stood there for a long moment. Then he sighed, went downstairs to take a shower.  
There were not many humans of any gender who would walk naked into an occupied Krogan bathhouse, but Captain Shepard was having a _bad fucking day_ , and he didn’t give a damn.  
Five naked Krogan stared back at him from the heated pool that took up most of the damp-walled room.  
“Hi,” Shepard said, flatly.  
He turned the single shower-head on- -the ‘sluice’, as it was called, because it’s primary function was ridding the bather of excess filth and gore before he entered the pool- -and took a bottle of liquid soap out of the bathing kit he’d brought.  
“Hey,” one of the Krogan ventured.  
“Hi Shepard,” said another.  
“Shepard?”  
“Sheparrrdd-”  
“Heyya, Shepard,” Grunt grinned, from the steam-clouded back corner.  
“Grunt, Galn, Rok,” Shepard replied the the faces he knew, smiling in spite of himself.  
“Shepard!” they called back happily.  
“Come do shots with us!” one of the older Krogan demanded, digging an unlabelled brownish-red bottle out of his weapon-pile at the edge of the pool.  
Shepard paused, rinsing the soap off of his body. He _should_ be getting back to his cabin soon, but nothing said he had to actually get INTO the pool with them…  
“-Why the hell not?” he agreed, shutting the water off.

-

Kaidan had a headache, and the Rachni weren’t helping. They were convinced- -not altogether without cause- -that the Krogan were trying to move in on their territory. The problem was that there were now THREE Rachni queens with active nests, and according to the Krogans manning a small supply depot just outside it, one of the queens had struck some sort of bargain with them, though what it was, they wouldn’t say.  
“How do you do it?” Kaidan asked Tau’ali.  
“Do what?” the Asari asked.  
“Let her into your head like that,” Kaidan replied, nodding- -carefully, dammit- -in the direction of the Rachni queen.  
“I represented her daughter in the peace conference two years ago,” Tau’ali shrugged, “-letting them speak through me is like… like in commando training, when the instructor shows you the next move by moving your limbs biotically.”  
“Free will, but… you go with it.”  
“Yes.”  
“-I’m glad she doesn’t try that on me,” Kaidan admitted, rubbing the back of his neck.  
“Of course not. You’re a biotic human Alpha, so… she basically sees you as a brood warrior,” Tau’ali explained, secretly waiting to see what color the Major would turn next.  
Instead, Kaidan started laughing, and winced.

-

Shepard woke up, without the slightest idea where he was. He was wrapped in a blanket of some thick, heavy cloth, that didn’t feel as though it had been woven with humans in mind. He was damp, in places. Also naked. This list wasn’t going well. An attempt to raise his head went even worse, and Shepard’s stomach churned dangerously. He groaned a little.  
“Hey, you’re alive…” Grunt greeted him, from somewhere outside his field of vision. “-I don’t think I’ve ever seen a human drink that much and live before... Are you gonna- -aw shit, HERE-”  
Something boxy and metal with corners was shoved into his hands, and Shepard threw up into it.  
“Feel better?” Grunt asked.  
“...No...” Shepard swallowed, thickly.  
“-Keep it,” Grunt snorted, and began rifling through a cabinet bolted into the wall.  
Shepard was sick again after a minute or two, but slowly edged his way up into a sitting position.  
“Got any water?” he asked, his voice rough.  
“You’ve done this before…” Grunt chuckled, and passed him a half-full metal canteen.  
“-Navy,” Shepard managed with a hint of humor, and fumbled the cap off. He drank a few sips, and let that settle, head down.  
“What does the shaking thing mean?” Grunt asked, bluntly.  
“-Uh?” Shepard looked up, using mostly just his eyes.  
“You’re shaking.”  
The blanket had pooled around his waist as Shepard attempted to sit up, and Grunt was absolutely right, he was shivering.  
“-Cold,” Shepard said, and re-capped the canteen, setting it aside. He pulled the blanket back up around his shoulders, and wrapped his arms around himself. There wasn’t much light in the room, but Shepard noticed that the blanket didn’t look quite… clean. Bloodstains. There was a little blood there. -From him?  
Oh.  
Right.  
The air seemed to thin, abruptly. He shut his eyes, feeling the compartment spin slowly around him. He had to threw up again, but here wasn’t much.  
“Damn, Shepard… you done?” Grunt asked, arms folded.  
“...Yeah,” Shepard decided, laying back down on the bunk that wasn’t his, “-f’r the moment…”  
“Heheh.”  
“...Can I just stay here ‘n sleep this off?” he asked hopefully, eyes shut.  
“Rok said to hit you if you moved anyway,” Grunt shrugged.  
“-Rok?” Shepard repeated, dully.  
“He looked you over after ya bled through the last blanket. Says you should be fine in a couple’a days,” he shrugged.  
“Ugghhh, _christ,_ ” Shepard groaned, and curled up on himself a little. This was NOT a part of his personal life he’d wanted to share with a ship full of Krogan.  
“Shepard, shut up. Yeah, everybody knows after what you pulled in the pool, but we respect how you’re handling this. Like a Krogan. Now sleep it off with the hangover, get your damn clothes back on, and maybe there’ll be some threshers left for you.”  
Shepard was silent for a long moment.  
“...Better be,” he muttered, eyes still shut. Five minutes later, he was asleep again.

-

Kaidan clicked his helmet down into place, and cycled the action of the weapon in his hands while the airlock hissed itself empty. The doors opened, and his team moved out.  
For a lifeless world, it looked as though somebody had had a hell of a party here recently. The scorch-marks and half-melted gleam of beam-rifle impact points peppered the rocks along the canyon’s side, and there were at least two kinds of craters, in addition to the loose-gravelled sinkholes of recent thresher maw activity.  
Around a bend of the canyon floor, the landing party stopped short.  
“Well,” Perry muttered, “-there’s somethin’ you don’t see every day…”  
Before them, dried out in the thin atmosphere like the elongated carcass of a small earth whale left too long on a beach, lay the stripped exoskeleton of a sizeable thresher maw. It had been dragged fully halfway out of it’s hole, and butchered for the meat it contained with great force and enthusiasm.  
“Krogans,” Tau’ali stated, “-the Queen was right, they are moving into this nebula.”  
“They’ve certainly been through here...” Kaidan agreed, surveying the tracks around the carcass carefully. He straightened up, and put his rifle away. “-Looks like they’re hunting on foot,” he added.  
“ON FOOT? Who does that?” she demanded.  
“Clan Urdnot, that I’m aware of…” Kaidan replied thoughtfully, “-and Captain Shepard,” he added, because he could.  
Behind him, Perry rolled his eyes. Kaidan turned and looked at the young marine knowingly, then began walking back towards the shuttle. Perry stared after him superstitiously, and didn’t move.  
“He didn’t read your mind,” Tau’ali assured him, patting his shoulder-armor tolerantly.  
“But-”  
“-You’re just _predictable_.”

-

“THRESHER STEAKS,” Galn declared, looking down into the dented metal tray in front of him with a feverish eye, “-LIFE GETS NO BETTER THAN THIS!”  
“Spoken like a Krogan who hasn’t gotten _laid_ lately…” the warrior sitting across from him laughed.  
“Are you still counting your _Varren_ ,..?” Galn leered back.  
Shepard spared the pair an amused glance, but his focus remained on his food, which could be said for nearly all the Krogan at the table. A fresh round of thresher steaks, in peacetime at least, was more than reason enough to just drop out of FTL at a random point in space and EAT for a while. ...He _had_ to get Kaidan to try this stuff sometime.

-

“We need to come up with a way for the Rachni to communicate telepathically over long distances,” Kaidan told the council.  
“I know of such prototypes,” the holographic Dalitress said, nonplussed, “-what is your purpose with such a device?”  
“I’ve spoken to all three Rachni queens now, and it’s a case of the right hand doesn’t know what the left is doing. Yes, the younger two both share the memories of the queen we released on Utukku, but now only one is willing to cut deals with the Krogan. If these queens don’t talk to each other soon, someone’s going to try and take out the Krogan warship that the third queen hired, and… well, you get the picture.”  
 _“Indeed,”_ the Turian Councilor said, thoughtfully.  
“Have you learned what the Krogans were promised?” the Asari Councilor asked.  
“Yes. This Nebula was held by the Rachni in ancient times, but since their extinction, the spread of thresher maws has gone completely unchecked. The third queen hired the Krogans to clear the maws out for her, and she’s been giving them a few of the more habitable colony worlds in exchange.”  
“What clan has she hired for this?” the Turian wanted to know.  
“It’s not a clan, Councilor. It’s Aralakh company,” Kaidan explained, “-they were nearly wiped out covering the retreat of the Rachni queen during the war, but they’ve been re-formed since, and Urdnot Grunt is still in command. -I believe he’s the one the third queen is really trusting, here.”  
“Well, I’m all for it,” the Turian said without hesitation, “-two aggressive, quick-breeding races, one out-of-the-way nebula…” he spread his hands.  
“I agree,” the Dalitress said, inclining her head.  
“Wait a minute, I seem to recall that LAST month you were highlighting the possibilities of neighbouring Krogan and _Human_ colonies-” the Councilor from Earth began.  
“What if the Rachni and the Krogan actually DO get along?” the Asari councilor interrupted him.  
“Ah- back to the problem of how we can get the three Rachni queens to talk to each other...?” Kaidan interjected.

-

Shepard lay back on his bunk, one hand under his head, and thumbed through the messages on his datapad. He’d read them all already, but sleep wouldn’t come. -Thresher steak was doing him no favors, there. Reliable extranet-links weren’t a major priority on the Krogan warship either, and though he and Kaidan had been writing short unsecured messages back and forth all along, it had been weeks since they’d been able to set up a face-to-face meeting. Shepard had needed the distance at first. Needed time, but- now he remembered Kaidan’s face beside him on half a dozen worlds before the council had even appointed them Spectres, and he just… missed him.

-

The Rachni were understandably nervous about letting ANYONE, even someone they knew from Shepard’s crew, set up complex machines in the very heart of their nests. Machines had burned them before. More than once.  
It got Kaidan to thinking….  
The tech might well work as advertized, but the repeated emphasis on the long-range telepathic array being a _prototype_ had begun to strike the Major as odd. He considered the Salarians, and the secret deal the last Dalitress had tried to cut with Shepard, their aid in the war effort in exchange for subtly sabotaging the Genophage cure.  
No, he decided reluctantly, he _didn’t_ put it past the Salarians to see the simultaneous trust of the Rachni queens as an opportunity not to be missed. But what to do about it now that the device was already being built? Kaidan would have insisted on testing the array himself, but he wasn’t telepathic, and Tau’ali was one of his, he didn't want to risk her if it could be avoided...

-

“Grunt, there you are,” Shepard leaned a hand casually against the heavy metal doorframe.  
“Shepard,” Grunt nodded, unfazed.  
“You know I’m having a blast out here with you guys, but when exactly are we gonna make port again?” he asked, fixing the young Krogan Captain with a pointed look.  
“Uhhhhh…”  
“-That’s what I thought.”  
“But we _like_ you, Shepard…” Grunt protested, “-and _you_  like to fight.”  
“I know Grunt, but I’m a Council Spectre, and they expected me back two weeks ago.”  
Grunt set his jaw, and looked stubborn. He didn’t actually have the words, ‘FUCK THE GALACTIC COUNCIL’ painted across his forehead-crest, but the sentiment was clear enough.  
“-And I want Kaidan,” Shepard added, firmly.  
Grunt gave a deep, long-suffering sigh.  
“Look- Shepard… what’s the Rachni queen gonna think if we leave the job half-done, huh? They’ve got scout-ships, they’ll know if we’ve jumped out of the nebula. ...She’s giving us WORLDS for this, okay? The Krogan need those...”  
“Uh… huh,” Shepard studied his face, thoughtfully. Grunt was definitely holding out on him. “-Then it’s a good thing the _Normandy_ happens to be within ten light years of here,” he said, folding his arms.  
“She’s WHAT? How did you do THAT?”  
“It’s got nothing to do with me,” Shepard shrugged, “-Kaidan had a mission in the next system over. He could come pick me up now, no problem. Or… you can tell me what we’re really doing out here.”  
“I… _can’t_ ,” Grunt admitted, “-I swore an oath. But I think it’s time you had a talk with Wrex. He tells it better anyhow,” He shouldered the shotgun he’d been re-assembling, and walked towards the doorway Shepard was standing in.  
“I thought you said you couldn’t _get_ a clear vidcom link from inside this nebula,” Shepard reminded him, coldly.  
“Yeah, that’s why I’m ordering us out to the edge,” Grunt retorted, “-now move.”  
Shepard shoved Grunt in the chest with both hands, hard. The Krogan’s balance swayed ever so slightly, but he didn’t bother stepping back to correct it.  
“My ship,” Grunt growled, leaning within inches of the human’s face, “-my orders.”  
“Don’t you _dare_ fuck with me,” Shepard warned him, unimpressed.  
“I’m not that stupid. And you’re not THIS stupid, Shepard,” Grunt said, poking him in the chest with a thick finger, “-talk to Wrex.”  
“FINE,” Shepard snarled, turned on his heel, and left.

-

With a low humm that was more felt than heard, the telepathic array spread out across the underground nest-chamber powered up. Kaidan folded his arms, watching tensely. He glanced at the brood-warrior across the chamber from him, who replied with a brief clash of the pincers at the end of one of his tentacle pods. Kaidan looked away. The Salarian technician who had set the array up was moving around busily now, muttering under his breath, and taking readings every few seconds. In the center of the room the third queen waited, seemingly calm.  
Kaidan had wondered at the fortitude of this queen’s mother back on Noveria, and as they shared the same memories, he had to wonder what this young queen was thinking that made her NEED to explain anything.  
Maybe he admired the ability of an individual to differentiate themselves most of all in species for whom the process seemed to be the most difficult.  
The Salarian ran a finger across an unbroken line of green bars on his readout screen, and said the array was ready. Tau’ali lowered a jointed metal band into place around the head of the queen, and it began to glow softly blue-white.  
“You may begin,” Tau’ali/the queen said resonantly, turning.  
It worked at first.  
Then about two minutes in, one of the power-relays on the array’s underside blew in a spectacular shower of fluid and sparks. Tau’ali fell to the ground between the queen’s forelegs, and sat holding her head, dazed. The brood warrior closest to the queen made a sudden and murderous rush at the wide-eyed Salarian technician, and Kaidan snapped a barrier up between them just in time. He immobilized the Salarian, and the two biotics, Rachni and Human, glared at each other for a long moment.  
“...Get thiiissss out of my nesssst…” Tau’ali slurred, pointing to the Salarian and breaking the standoff between the two.  
“Yes, ma’am,” Kaidan said quickly, put the Salarian over his shoulder, and ran. Strangely, the Rachni let them go. On the surface, Kaidan was met by two alliance marines.  
“Sir? What the hell happened down there?”  
“Thank you so much for saving my life-” the Salarian began, as Kaidan lowered him back down.  
“Throw this guy in the brig and make sure he stays there,” Kaidan ordered, offering the marines the Technician at arm’s length, “-sweep him for electronics first.”

-

When Wrex finished speaking, there was a long silence. Shepard’s gloved hands tightened at either side of the console in front of him with a barely-audible scrape of ceramic armor plates against metal.  
“Your guys brought me out here… to use as a BARGAINING CHIP?” He repeated aloud.  
“NO. Nobody TRADES my friends, and YOU needed a vacation,” Wrex accused, pointing directly into the holo-cam “-but these Rachni spook easy, Shepard… The queen Grunt talked to wants to use what we’re doing to prove to the other two queens that we Krogan can be trusted. But we’ve gotta DO it first, and if the hunting party runs into some of the OTHER two queens’ Rachni before that and we have to slaughter them... well, the deal’s off, right?”  
“...So you brought me into this as a- flag of truce?”  
“Basically… yeah.”  
Shepard sighed.  
“Okay. First, don’t ever involve me in Krogan politics without asking again. Second, you FUCKING OWE ME now, and third, I need to rendezvous with the _Normandy_.”  
“That’s fair,” Wrex nodded, “She’s right there in the same nebula, you said.”  
“Yeah, Kaidan’s in command.”  
“Well that’s a plus,” Wrex rumbled, amused.  
“You think I’d trust my ship to just anyone?” Shepard countered, folding his arms.  
“Council sent Kaidan here to help the other Rachni, didn’t they,” Wrex guessed, shrewdly.  
“Yeah. Something about _uninvited guests_ …” Shepard began.

-

“You sabotaged the transmitter,” Tau’ali realized, sitting down on the crate beside him.  
“Just enough, yeah.” Kaidan tore the top edge of his field-ration envelope open, and cracked the heat-pin on the side with his thumb.  
“...Is that the only reason the device blew?” the Asari commando asked, frowning a little as she considered.  
“No, I just made a small cut in the wall of a conductive fluid line underneath, to act as an emergency circuit-breaker. It blew because of a surge further up in the system. I didn’t cause that.”  
The warm scent of meat and tomato sauce reminded Tau’ali of the unopened ration in her own hands, and she sliced off the top with a thin but very sharp-looking blade that folded out of the side of her necklace.  
“So this was an assassination attempt,” she said, cracking the pin.  
“We’ll never be able to prove it. What matters is that the queens are safe.”  
“-Ughh, Salarians…” Tau’ali stirred her food as it came up to temperature, “-never trust anybody under thirty.”  
“Hnh… well… I was the one who ordered that thing brought down here. I’m surprised the queen let us back into her nest at all. I mean, if somebody had-” Kaidan broke off, and took a bite of his food.  
“You took a risk Major, but you also took steps to protect her,” Tau’ali pointed out, “-and me.”  
“Mh,” Kaidan nodded noncommittally.

-

Shepard woke up in a cold sweat, with a twist of blanket caught around his left wrist. He yanked himself free and sat up, breathing hard, backing against the hard metal of the bulkhead until his fingers found the lightswitch. He flipped it, looked around for a moment at the empty cabin, and then shut his eyes with a sigh.  
The dreams.  
He’d always had rip-roaring nightmares from time to time, but after Akuze, the fears that he habitually banished to the back of his mind had begun to grow faces. To learn their own names. He should have dealt with it then, but the event itself had still been too recent, the risk of being medically discharged if he gave the brass just one more reason to doubt him, too real.  
Yeah.  
A real Beta could have handled the loss of his _entire unit_ without whining about it afterwards, right?  
Shepard left the light on, and pulled his datapad out of the gear-bag on the floor beside his bunk.

-

Kaidan held his hand out flat for a moment, not quite steady. He lowered it with a sigh, and switched on the glowing framework of his omni-tool, changing one of the settings.  
“Are you all right?” Tau’ali asked confidentially, putting a hand on his arm.  
“...How much do you know about Humans?” Kaidan countered, after a moment.  
“I know this probably has something to do with your mate,” she admitted, “-but not much else.”  
“Then yeah, I’m all right,” Kaidan told her, shutting his omni-tool off.  
“-Bullshit,” Tau’ali decided, an expression she’d picked up recently from Perry.  
“You’re learning. How about, I’ll _be_ all right?” Kaidan admitted.  
“That, I’d believe.”

-

 _“Decontamination sequence in progress…”_  
The process had supposedly been improved in recent years, but so far as Shepard could tell, the only difference was that getting back onto his ship took slightly _longer_ , and right now that was just way _too_  long…  
Kaidan met him on the other side of the airlock door, alone.  
Shepard buried his face in the side of the other man’s neck, eyes shut, and felt Kaidan’s arms close tightly around him through his armor. He smelled _so good_...  
“Welcome home, Shepard,” Kaidan murmured, scarred lips soft against his ear.  
Shepard squeezed his eyes shut tight, his breathing rough. He felt a warm hand cupping the back of his head, steady, and swallowed a couple of times.  
“...I need to get out of this armor,” Shepard decided, drawing back to rest his forehead against Kaidan’s.  
“You do,” Kaidan agreed, and kissed his temple.

-


	2. The Kind You Keep

Shepard woke up to the feeling of Kaidan’s hand stroking slowly all the way down his back, and if he’d been dreaming a moment ago, he didn’t remember it.  
“Mmm…”  
“Hey… heh. ...This is a switch,” Kaidan said, looking down at him.  
“You waking up first?”  
“Yeah…”  
“I could get to like it,” Shepard murmured, happily. Kaidan kissed his hair, and kept running one hand down along the curve of his spine, in no hurry. Now and then his fingers would venture lower, ghosting across a tight, athletic ass he knew well. Too much for Shepard ignore, not enough to push back against, just waking up the nerves for now… He began to squirm on top of Kaidan at the light touch, hardening, tiny sounds that could have been encouragement or protest coming loose. Kaidan bit the angle of Shepard’s neck and shoulder lightly, and rolled his hips once, letting the other man know just how mutual the feeling was. Shepard froze and swore, eyes shut. Kaidan let him go, and Shepard pushed himself up, sitting not-quite-back across Kaidan’s hips. Just enough to feel the hot, firm line of his dick pressing between his cheeks, out of line, but ready.   
Shepard shifted a little. Flexed, pressing the sides of Kaidan’s piece firmly without taking him in, because he could. Kaidan’s breath caught with a slight frown of concentration, clearing as he regained his center. Two could play this game.  
Shepard looked down into his face, eyes bright and untrustworthy.  
“Is that an offer?”  
“What do you think?” Kaidan smirked.  
“I think it’s too late to take it back…” Shepard promised.

-

“Hey, welcome back, Captain...”  
“Joker,” Shepard nodded, taking a drink of coffee and leaning an elbow on the back of the pilot’s chair.  
“So how was your ‘vacation’?” Joker asked, carefully not looking him in the eye.  
“-Improving,” Shepard replied, with a smile that was more felt than seen. “-what’s the situation here?”  
“In orbit over planet Ant-farm. -It’s _exciting_.”  
“Carry on.”

-

Shepard ducked under a low-hanging finger of stone just before the main nest chamber, and saw a diffuse, blue-gray light coming from up ahead. He switched off the flashlight of his omnitool, and entered. The queen pivoted on her walking legs, and bent down to look at him with interest. Shepard looked up, gun held casually barrel-down at his side. Kaidan stood nearby, watching the glowing-centered mandibles flexing thoughtfully not five feet above Shepard's head, and felt slightly ill.  
He knew her. He’d talked with her on multiple occasions, protected her recently, and even been part of the team that had set her ancestress free years ago on Noveria... But this was _Shepard_. And those were some awfully big jaws right next to his head.  
Shepard looked around at the respectful throng of all-natural Rachni lining the room.  
“-You’ve been busy,” he complimented the queen, folding his arms.  
“Shall I translate?” Tau’ali offered.  
“Please,” Shepard nodded.  
Tau’ali shut her eyes for a moment, then opened them, her face losing nearly all expression.  
“Welcome, Shepard… yes, we… have found a good place here for our children. And new allies.”  
“I’m pretty fond of the Krogan myself,” Shepard allowed.  
“You too have been busy,” Tau’ali/the queen said, inclining her head.  
“Well, there’s still a lot of Thresher-maws left.”  
“Yesss…” Tau’ali/the queen agreed, knowingly.  
“Spectre Alenko tells me you’ve been having some trouble explaining your deal with the Krogan to your mother and sister. I thought you were all of the same mind about these things.”  
“This is true when we are born, and learn the songs of our mothers… after thiss… we grow into the nests we make.”  
“-Huh,” Shepard looked thoughtful.  
“There’s no recorded history of the Rachni making deals with anyone except for you and Grunt,” Kaidan reminded him, “-during the ah, old war, no-one could get in close enough. This is new ground for them. -And they’re not doing half bad.”  
“It is… different,” Tau’ali/the queen nodded carefully, “-but we see it is useful.”  
It occurred to Shepard that the Rachni would benefit from being taught how to play poker some time, but he held his tongue. Much as he trusted the minds of the queens he’d met so far, he preferred this race honest.  
“Your brood-warrior has also been most useful,” the Tau’ali/the queen added.  
“My-?” Shepard began, then paused, and looked from the queen to Kaidan and back again.  
“ _Not. Worth it,_ ” Kaidan emphasized, under his breath.  
“-Oh yeah, you’re welcome,” Shepard agreed, “-so, how about visiting the other Rachni queens in a scout ship or something? Or you know, get close enough so that you can hear each others’ song?”

-

“Way to take over my mission, Shepard,” Kaidan joked, pushing the breastplate of his armor off over his head.  
“-I’m sorry?” Shepard ventured. -He hadn’t actually thought about it, just started talking to an old friend. -Identical descendant of an old friend. Who. Happened to be a giant alien bug-queen.  
“I’m kidding. You have a thing with the Rachni like I have a thing with human Biotics, and you’ve got her at least thinking about making the trip. I suggested the _same damned thing_  a week ago, and the third queen wouldn’t even consider it.” Kaidan set the top half of his armor aside, and started taking off his shin-guards. Shepard frowned, put his gloves away, and reached down for the buckle of his holster-belt.  
“This is a problem,” he decided, “-I mean, it’s convenient now, but what happens when I get tied up with a mission halfway across the galaxy? Or in two hundred years?”  
Kaidan glanced up using mostly just his eyes, and shrugged uneasily.  
“Yeah, no kidding. The queen needs to make more friends….” he began.  
“Or at least understand that there are other Humans she needs to take seriously.”  
“Yeaaah, good luck with that, Shepard,” Kaidan said, wryly.  
“-You ARE angry,” Shepard realized.  
Kaidan sat down on the bench in front of the lockers with a sigh.  
“Yes,” he admitted, “-but not at you.”  
“Talk to me,” Shepard ordered, setting his belt aside. He put one boot up on the bench beside Kaidan, and leaned forwards a little to listen, elbow on his knee.  
“The Rachni…” Kaidan ran a hand back over his hair, “-the Rachni, I understand where they’re coming from. They think I’m a brood-warrior because to them, I mean- -I _am_. But the rest of the galaxy has no excuse. And… I’m gonna be honest with you Shepard, it’s getting _old_.”  
Shepard nodded once, silent.  
“Nobody beats you as a Spectre. I know that,” Kaidan began again.  
“ _Kaidan-_ ” Shepard started to object.  
“-Let me finish,” he held up a hand, “-people listen to you when they won’t listen to _anyone_. You know it, and I know it.”  
Shepard nodded, reluctantly.  
“The problem is, everyone puts so much faith in you, I can’t do my damned job,” Kaidan bit off, “-which means I can’t take any of the _pressure_  off you. And I want to, because I think you need it.”  
“You know me…” Shepard said, neutrally.  
Shepard _loved_  being in control, and those three words were about as close as admission as Kaidan was going to get, that the Captain might be secretly wondering when he was going to get a break- -one that didn’t involve heats and emotionally painful Omega-biology- -at all.  
“Yeah,” Kaidan agreed, “-I _do_  know you.”

-

Sitting at his desk in the cabin, Shepard swirled the liquid in his glass until the white powder he’d added dissolved, and took a cautious drink. He made a face and set it down to finish later, opening the first of his Spectre-address messages.   
The council was sympathetic and walking on eggshells.  
Political…  
Political...  
The council was dubious.  
Thane’s son was getting married on Kahje in a year, and had sent him an invite, though he said he’d understand if Shepard and Kaidan couldn’t make it.  
The council was _enraged_.  
Jack wanted Kaidan to un-block her address. Again. Shepard forwarded it, knowing better than to ask why. Some Alpha thing, it had to be...  
The council wanted him to know that they’d sent Kaidan away on a mission, and that he shouldn’t worry about where.  
Political…  
Fundraiser… two weeks ago. Shit.  
Some kind of unrest on the Batarian border the council wanted looked into…  
The cabin door slid open.  
“-I thought I’d find you here,” Kaidan said, with that odd, unaffected happiness that the universe seemed to gift him with completely at random.   
“Hey-” Shepard smiled, but didn’t turn. Kaidan slid his hands down over Shepard’s shoulders, fingers rubbing across the upper part of his chest through his shirt in a way that made his eyes want to close… “...s’cheating…” Shepard mumbled, leaning his head back.  
“Heheh…”   
Kaidan’s fingers slowed after a minute or two, and Shepard could tell the other man was reading the open message-screen over his head.  
“I wonder what the Batarian border thing is…?” he said, “-I didn’t get that one.”  
“Well... you’re still on the Rachni mission here,” Shepard reasoned.  
“Sending YOU to the Batarian border?” Kaidan scowled, “-they’ve got to be kidding. Why not just fire on one of the Batarian ships and be done with it?”  
“Maybe that’s the point,” Shepard shrugged sleepily, “-they figure I’ll ground whatever storm’s brewing out there, and bring it down into the open where they can deal with it.”  
He couldn’t see Kaidan’s expression with his eyes closed, but he heard the disapproving exhale.  
“What are you drinking?” Kaidan asked instead, changing the subject.  
“-Guess,” Shepard opened his eyes.  
“Looks like water, or vodka.”  
“Half right.”  
“Half and half?” Kaidan asked, with an unimpressed curl of his upper lip.  
“No.”  
“Just water?”  
“Close, but no,” Shepard replied, beginning to enjoy the game.  
“Water, but there used to be ice cubes in it?” Kaidan guessed.  
“ _Damn_  you’re good, but no...”  
“I give up.”  
“Antiacid,” Shepard confessed, wryly, “-I’ve been missing human food, and I... ate too much.”  
“ _Shepard…_ ” Kaidan laughed, and kissed the top of his head.  
“Hey, I’ve lived off some rough rations, but just YOU try eating Thresher steaks for weeks on end…” Shepard began.  
“That’s the thing, I probably COULD,” Kaidan pointed out, still laughing.  
“Then why don’t YOU go thresher-hunting with the Krogans next?” Shepard demanded, grinning a little.  
Both men stopped laughing after a moment, and looked at each other.  
“I could, you know,” Kaidan repeated.  
“Would you?” Shepard asked hopefully, “-I mean, someone the Rachni all recognize has to, and-”  
“Sure.”  
“Thanks. -Take a box of rations with you anyway, I was going to.”  
“I will,” Kaidan nodded.  
Shepard took a breath, and let it out slowly. It occurred to him belatedly that Thresher maws were /really fucking dangerous/ prey. And that maybe he wasn’t right in the head for finding the act of killing them therapeutic, especially given his own history with the things…  
But he DID like killing them. It felt _good_.  
Kaidan… Kaidan could take care of himself in almost any situation, Shepard knew. Part of his mind was still uneasy at the thought of having just volunteered Kaidan for this mission, but… giving in to the temptation to say so out loud would do irreparable damage, and he knew _that_ , too...

-

Morning.  
Kaidan snapped the last buckle of his blue and white armor together, and straightened. Something was wrong, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. He didn’t want to leave Shepard, that wasn’t new… but they were both serving officers, and Spectres to boot. He’d done this dozens of times. Gotten through it. Come back, or Shepard had rejoined him…  
This time, it felt like it had on Horizon.  
Bad. A kind of tearing, like if he let Shepard out of his sight _this time_ , he’d never see him again.  
Stop it... he wasn’t leaving Shepard to die somewhere, he was leaving him in command of the _Normandy_ , with Joker, and Tau’ali, and a LOT of good people they both trusted backing him up.  
But still.  
Shepard. Waking up beside him, scruffy and loose-limbed. Sleepy, deep-blue eyes, and that little smile Kaidan doubted anyone else got to see. A stretch on his way to the shower, hands up against the top of the doorframe, shoulders bunched just so, with the bathroom light on behind him.  
Shepard. Coffee, and serious eyes over a datapad, and the mild annoyance of noticing that his electric razor had been borrowed and left on the guard-setting Shepard used for buzzing his head. Again.

  
Shepard walked up to him wearing marine-utility black and whites, the sleeves rolled crisply, and ran his fingers over the scratched white Spectre emblem on the front of Kaidan's breastplate.  
"You ready to go?" he asked, looking up.  
"-Yeah," Kaidan nodded once. He didn’t really want to leave, and they both knew it. Shepard didn’t want him gone, but....   
The Captain’s hand fisted around the top edge of his husband’s armor, and he looked him in the eyes, hard.  
“You are a magnificent fucking beast, and I expect you back here in one piece. ...Is that clear?” he demanded.  
“Aye-aye, sir,” Kaidan replied, and this time his voice sounded firm.

-

It was too quiet.  
Shepard headed down to engineering, and talked with chief Conrad for a while. He caught up with Otochre and Hillerman upstairs, and attempted to bother Joker next, without much success. Finally, he ended up down in the armory with Perry.  
Shepard’s gray N7 armor, the suit he’d brought with him when he left to go hunting with Aralakh Company, was spread out in a remarkable number of parts over the surface of one long table. The Captain frowned, deciding whether to compliment the young marine for his initiative, or rebuke him for assuming the armor wouldn’t be needed any time soon.  
“Four point seven hours,” he said instead, picking up a small armor plate at random.  
“Sir?” Perry asked, looking up.  
“To break this suit down completely and put it back together again,” Shepard explained.  
“Yes sir…” Perry agreed, “-if it’s not damaged.” He put his red-handled mag-driver down, and passed Shepard a tubular section of upper-arm armor. The outside surface of the plate looked fine, but the side-edges were dull. Shepard pulled his black-bladed utility knife, and probed the damage thoughtfully with it’s point. The layers of which the ceramic composite was made flaked apart, just a little. ...Acid delamination. It wouldn’t have hurt the suit’s performance against beam-weaponry for a while yet, but if he’d gone back out with the Krogan and the acid had kept working it’s way in…  
Shepard hadn’t had time to do a full breakdown inspection on his armor since he’d left the Citadel, but still… he should have caught this.   
“Good eye,” he told the Marine, putting a hand on the younger man’s shoulder that could be taken as a complement or simply proprietary. “Scrap it, salvage what you can.”  
Shepard dropped the small section of armor back onto the table.  
“Scrap it?” Perry repeated.  
“Scrap it,” Shepard nodded, “-prep my Scorpion armor instead, I don’t have time to fuck around with this.”  
“Aye, sir. What about the symbol?” He tapped the subdued gray greek letter omega that had been layered underneath the N7 badge of Shepard’s armor. It was completely against regs of course, a throwback to the US Army patches of the late 2040’s, but the Captain been wearing it that way for several years now.  
“When my new armor comes in, add it. Check the armory stores, there should still be a couple blanks, but if not, talk to chief Conrad. -People like to aim for it in battle, so we started fabbing them out of thin-sliced hull plating.”  
“-And it’s on the right-hand side,” Perry noted, appreciatively.  
“Very good,” Shepard nodded, amused.   
“Why wear an omega symbol at all? If- -you don’t mind my asking, sir.”  
“Because it throws people off-balance.,” Shepard replied, honestly. “-And because it's mine.”  
The fact that Cerberus had once seen fit to neatly laser-brand the same symbol onto his cheek, Shepard didn’t say.

-

Kaidan was nearly out of time, but the barrier held, acid hissing off the blue shimmer around him like beading, toxic rain. He could feel the maw in front of him, feel how deeply and violently ALIVE the creature was.  
And hell.  
He needed the energy.  
Focusing, he found a ‘thread’ coming off the glow at the monster’s mouth, and reached out for it, hauling back with his fist when the contact was solidly made. The thresher maw reacted instantly, thrashing in a wide circle to knock down and crush as many enemies as it could.  
The Krogan figured this was a good time to switch to omni-weapons.

-

A week.  
Not long, really.   
Shepard dropped down off the pull-up bar in the hold, and leaned back against the cold metal frame of the storage shelves. He missed talking to James, in this small space.   
Shepard shut his eyes, catching his breath.  
Kaidan had been gone. A _week_.  
...This wasn’t good.

-

288: Hey  
167: IAM  
288: ok  
167: HERE  
288: caps  
167:   
288: It’s good to talk to you  
167: yeah  
288: I fought Gark the other night  
167: what  
288: it was fun. He was being a jerk  
167: heh  
288: you?  
167: we go tomorrow. took time to line it up but everyone’s on board.  
288: that’s great. I’ll see you soon- I want to  
167: I know. you feel ok?  
288: I’m fine, why?  
167: think I picked up something from the water recyc system where you are.  
288: well that’s a comforting thought  
167: fair warning  
288: heh  
167: doc’s looking into it, I’ll let you know  
288: that’s good.  
167: I love you  
288: I know  
don’t get me started in the mess hall  
167: I love you and I miss waking up to feeling you breathe against my shoulder  
288: keep talking

-

“Captain!”  
“Not now, Karin,” Shepard cut her off as he headed into the elevator with Perry and Tau’ali. Chakwas followed the three armored figures in without hesitation, datapad in hand. The heavy elevator door slid closed behind her. Chakwas held the datapad out to him and waited, pointedly.  
Shepard gave the older woman a very flat look, and took it.   
He read what was on the screen. Blinked once and read it again with almost no change of expression, though above the black and sand-colored plates of his armor, his face might have been just a shade paler. He handed the datapad back to Chakwas without looking at it again, and raised a hand to his right ear.  
“ _Hillerman._ ”  
“Sir?” Hillerman came on, a moment later.  
“Something’s come up. Grab your gear and meet the ground team in the shuttle bay,” Shepard ordered, “-you’re taking this mission.”  
“-Is everything all right, Captain?”   
“Did I stutter?” Shepard asked, dangerously.  
“No sir, on my way. Hillerman out.”  
Tau’ali and Perry exchanged a glance behind Shepard’s back, and tried very, very hard to look anywhere else until the elevator door opened again. They got out at the shuttlebay deck, Shepard didn’t.  
“I’ll be on the comm,” he told them by way of apology. Tau’ali nodded, and the elevator doors separated them.  
Shepard took a breath, one hand against the wall by the elevator control panel, and shut his eyes.  
“...Is that accurate?” he asked, nodding in the datapad’s direction without opening them.  
“Yes, it is,” Chakwas told him, simply.  
“I- I’ve got a mission. To run,” Shepard swallowed..  
“I know. Let me see your wrist,” she instructed, gently.  
He took his right glove off, and offered her his hand without a word. Chakwas took his pulse with two fingers, nodded once, and let him have his hand back.  
“Normal… for you. We can talk more about this later.”  
“-Okay,” Shepard nodded.

-

Kaidan’s omnitool beeped. He glanced down at his wrist when he was sure there were no more Varren coming, and smiled when he saw the sender. Rain dripped off the trees around him, and left clean spots on his streaked blue armor. Heading back towards the Krogan transport truck, Kaidan sent,  
[288: dirtside.]  
[167: secure?]  
[288: mopping up. soon.]  
Shepard didn’t reply. ‘Don’t message in combat’ was one of their mutually understood rules, even if ‘don’t message on missions’ had slipped long ago.  
[288: In truck] Kaidan sent about twenty minutes later, [varren guts don’t smell very good.]  
[167: heh don’t start. switching to encrypted]  
The contact dropped, and a moment later the band around Kaidan’s wrist beeped again, differently. Grunt, who knew what that slight difference in tone meant, glanced over, his reptilian eyes patient.  
[Shepard: com ck?]  
[Alenko: good.]  
[Shepard: ok]  
[Alenko: what’s up]  
There was a pause of nearly thirty seconds, during which the truck wallowed through a shallow stream, water and muddy gravel scouring the vehicle’s doors and undercarriage, temporarily drowning out the voices of the Krogan around him. Kaidan held on for the ride, then checked the display at his wrist again.  
[Shepard: I’m pregnant]  
“ _...What?_ ” Kaidan whispered out loud, breathless..  
“Eauh?” the Krogan sitting next to him wanted to know, using his advantage in height to angle for a look at what the human battle-master was typing. Kaidan swiftly angled his wrist the other way, which gave Grunt, sitting on his left, a perfect view at the message.  
Grunt grinned back at him, and took a breath to yell something.  
 _I’ll kill him_ , Kaidan thought.  
“SHEPARD FIGURED IT OUT!” Grunt announced, mercilessly. The troop compartment exploded with sound, cheering and long-suppressed laughter in about even parts. Kaidan was shoved from several directions at once in congratulations, and headbutted in a way that left his ears ringing. The Krogan who had done this was in turn headbutted by the warrior who had been sitting across from him, and Grunt yanked Kaidan clear of whatever was about to go down next by the back collar of his armor.  
“KNOCK IT OFF BEFORE I THROW YOU OUT THE HATCH!” the young Krogan bellowed at the other two, who had now taken their differences to the compartment floor.  
“...You KNEW?” Kaidan demanded dangerously, turning with one hand to the trickle of blood that was beginning at his forehead.  
“We ALL knew,” Grunt leered back at him, “-whaddya think this trip has been _about_?”  
The other Krogan found this statement funny as hell.  
“Are you kidding me, I-” Kaidan stared, then paused and held up one finger, “-hangonnasecond.”  
[Alenko: Zh]  
[Alenko: Shepard ]  
[Alenko: are you still there?]  
[Shepard: yes]  
[Alenko: i can’t think]  
[Alenko: I’m happy.]  
[Shepard: breathe.]  
[Alenko: heh you would say that. feeling ok?]  
[Shepard: fine]  
[Alenko: brb krigan]

-


	3. Homefront

“So,” Joker observed, “-here you are. Hanging out on the bridge with me. That’s not weird.”  
Shepard took a drink of his coffee, and watched the Rachni ship on the holo-screen to Joker’s left, cruising silently through space alongside the _Normandy_.  
“-You could do it more often,” Joker added, playing with one of his right-hand screens. Shepard looked thoughtfully down at him and saw, as always, the top of Joker’s baseball cap.  
“How did your sister’s Varren project go?” he asked, tapping the brim down a little.  
“Mmmnot good,” the beta admitted, readjusting his hat with a slight grin, “-but they finally found a home for the last one.”  
Shepard snorted.  
They watched the flow of stars out the front window for a while.  
“What was it like growing up in a Creche?” Shepard asked.  
“I’m surprised you don’t ask Kaidan,” Joker said, looking up and back at him, “-he spent summers at his granddad’s place in BC, remember?”  
“He said it was all hard work, sunshine and roses, so I’m asking you,” Shepard shrugged.  
“Fair enough. It’s uh… loud? Well, not all the time. I went to school with pretty much all the kids I was related to and then some, so like twenty…” Joker frowned a little, and changed a setting on his center display image, then continued. “The adults got tired of seeing me in casts all the time, so they mostly let me stay inside and play video games. I could beat _anybody_. -Also learned a little hacking from my mother.”  
“So you were born there? In the same Creche?” Shepard wanted to know.  
“Um… yeaaah?” Joker replied, as if that was too obvious for words, “-that’s kind of the point of living in a Creche, the adults get to dump all the kids in one place, and the kids technically have like three parents each, sometimes all four. I had four. I mean, I only lived with the two like you’d expect, but my father was the one who kept making me go outside. Fuckin’ alpha hardass. My dad was way more laid back.”  
“Sounds nice,” Shepard decided carefully, “-if you’re a farmer.”  
“Yeah, but just you try _getting away_  with anything in a place like that…” Joker shuddered, “-and for your information,” the pilot added archly, “-my Creche was mostly _architects_ \- you know beforethereapershitit-  -my sister still is, and me? I’m way out here where I belong, drivin’ the bus...”  
“Carry on, Joker,” Shepard said, with the hint of a smile.  
Moreau was bored out of his mind again, Shepard thought privately as he walked back towards the CIC. He decided to assign him Lt. Dodd from sensor control as a copilot for a while, her astronavigation skills could use the refresh...

-

“So,” Kaidan began, when Grunt had finished pouring, “-tell me again, _what_  just happened here?”  
Grunt set the bottle down on the table between them with an amused snort, and leaned back against the bench, arms across the top on either side.  
“It’s like this… Shepard is our _friend_. Every Krogan alive OWES him for getting the Genophage cured… so when we saw he was havin’ a problem that happens with our females sometimes… well… we figured we’d help ‘im out.”  
“I say again,” Kaidan repeated patiently, “- _what did you do_?”  
“We LIED,” Grunt rumbled, grinning. “Wrex figured the reason you guys weren’t having any luck with this was because Shepard was _thinking_  about it too hard. I mean come on, the whole damn galaxy expected you guys to have kids for the first couplea years or so… and losing one, even if you don’t really _got_  them yet- -well. That’s something we Krogan know something about.”  
“You would,” Kaidan nodded thoughtfully, listening.  
“So Wrex put me and Aralakh Company on the job. Orders were simple. Look for an excuse to get Shepard stinking drunk, and then trick him into thinking he’s missed his shot, so he stops _waiting_  for it to happen.”  
Kaidan took a swallow of his drink, and didn’t immediately reply.  
“And then we just kept Shepard distracted with... stuff we knew he liked to do,” the Krogan shrugged, slugging down his own drink and pouring a re-fill.  
‘Stuff they knew Shepard liked to do.’  
Like fighting thresher maws that the Krogan had been hired by the Rachni to kill, which was of course purely coincidental…  
Shepard had been out there with the Krogan hunting party for nearly two months. Pregnant. And… apparently having a great time.  
Aralakh Company. Wrex had dedicated not just one of his top Captains, but Grunt’s entire _unit_  to this project. To keeping Shepard alive, at whatever cost.  
By human standards, Kaidan should shoot Grunt where he sat for taking a chance like that with the life of his Omega. ...But by their own standards, the Krogan had just done Shepard one of the highest honors Kaidan had ever heard of, and it wasn’t as though he could argue with their results. The Major’s head hurt a little, and it had nothing to do with his L2.  
“Thank you, Grunt,” he decided, after a pause.  
“Well… I can’t fight Shepard’s clan if he never makes one, you know?” the Krogan reasoned, slyly.  
Kaidan gave him an exasperated look, and finished his drink.  
“Be careful what you wish for.”  
They weren’t out of this yet.

-

Shepard stalked into the infirmary and shut the door.  
“Good evening, Shepard,” Chakwas said, looking up from something she was doing at the computer terminal.  
“I talked to the council just now,” Shepard began shortly, shrugging out of his leather jacket and leaving it over the back of a chair as he began to pace.  
“And?”  
“They wanted me on the- -they wanted me on my next mission,” the Captain broke off and corrected himself. “-Of course when I told them I couldn’t make it and why, they said it was fine, that they’d just get somebody else…”  
“That makes sense,” Chakwas agreed, carefully.  
“Karin, they’re _sidelining_  me,” Shepard snapped, “-ALREADY. I don’t even _look_  pregnant yet! They wanted me off the Rachni mission too, and as strange as this sounds, I can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be right now than in Rachni-controlled space with a company of Krogan at my back. Goddammit, I can TRUST _them_...”  
“Would you like something to drink?” Chakwas asked, getting up.  
“Sure,” Shepard agreed shortly, without really considering the question.  
The doctor drew some hot water from the dispenser in the corner, and began making two mugs of tea. Shepard frowned at her back as she did this, but didn’t comment.  
“Look,” he began again, “-you’ve been a military doctor your whole life, how do I keep this ‘don’t worry your little head’ crap from going too far?”  
Chakwas handed him one of the mugs of tea, and Shepard tried the stuff without looking down at it. It... tasted like a handful of grass with maybe some flowers and dried leaves thrown in for luck, but it settled his stomach a little, and lacked the distinctive flavor of corrosion and fishtank-filter that the water of _some_  of the vessels he’d served on had had.  
“You’re a soldier, Captain,” Chakwas reasoned, in between blowing across her own tea, “-you know as well as I do that makes you expendable.”  
“...Way to cheer me up, doc,” Shepard said, dryly.  
“How you get through this without losing the council’s confidence is, _you don’t_. You back off about how much you can still do and handle now, before they start thinking about assigning you bodyguards or something, and when you’ve had your baby and you’re ready to return, you USE that to prove you never stopped thinking like a soldier,” Chakwas explained, “-and _that’s_  when you don’t let up.”  
“You’re a very frightening woman,” Shepard complimented her, after a moment’s thought.  
Chakwas smiled, and drank her tea.

-

“That,” Kaidan said, reading the planetary scan data over the Krogan pilot’s shoulder, “-is a _lot_  of surface radiation.”  
“Yeah- too hot for us Krogan to bother with, but the Rachni want it,” Grunt shrugged, re-fastening a metal buckle at his wrist. “-We figured to leave this one for last, after we got rid of Shepard, but since that’s already happened... heh. Think you can hack it?”  
“In full armor, sure…” Kaidan nodded, folding his arms. “-But what about ship-to-surface weapons?”  
“...Are you _kidding_  me?” Grunt demanded, disgustedly.  
“No. Plant some infrasonic charges down there in an open area, get the hell out, set them off, and dig the Rachni a nice sandbox from orbit when the maws come to investigate. It might take a couple of days, but we’d get them all.”  
Grunt and the Krogan pilot looked at each other.  
“NAAAH.”  
“NAAHH.”

-

In orbit around the nest-world of the oldest Rachni queen, the _Normandy_  welcomed it’s ground team back on board. Shepard wasn’t feeling good at all, but he made a point of being there. They seemed ok. Perry was looking at Tau’ali differently, he noticed, but only when the young marine thought the Asari wasn’t paying attention. Interesting. Then again, _everybody_  liked the Asari...  
“Captain, do you have a minute?” Hillerman asked, looking at Shepard uncomfortably.  
“Shoot,” he replied, a little tiredly.  
“-I was hoping we could speak in private,” the lieutenant clarified. Shepard considered the rough-cut young alpha Kaidan had talked him out of throwing off the ship at Arcturus a little over a year ago levelly, then nodded.  
“My quarters in an hour, unless it’s urgent. Clean up, get some chow first.”  
“Aye, Sir.”

-

“FALL BACK!” Grunt yelled over the wind, “-GET YOUR QUADS OUT OF HERE, _NOW!_ ”  
Kaidan hit the base of the hydra’s neck-structure with as heavy a cryo-blast as he could call up, and ran with the others. Two of the Krogan who chose to turn and fight rear-guard were eaten by a head about thirty feet back from where the main three heads branched. Here and there on the circular flatland that surrounded them, waves of fine yellow sand shifted and heaved, boiling up into a cloud that hid the shuttle- but the engines were screaming up, and the hatch was already open. They went for it, and the Hydra, hauling it’s twisting, many-branched body forwards through the loose sulphur-sand bowl of the crater as quickly as it could, went for _them_.  
The Krogan pilot looked back over his shoulder into the crew compartment, then forwards at his incoming threat-radar, and gunned it, clawing for altitude as hard as possible. Everyone who had gotten aboard slammed into the floor and back wall of the shuttle in a confused heap of flailing limbs and armored bodies. Kaidan was near the top of the pile, fortunately. He felt a Krogan’s elbow slam into the side of his chestplate with a crack, caught sight of one warrior losing his grip on the edge of the door from the outside, another holding on firmly-  
And beyond them, out the open gulf of the shuttle’s side-door, a many-branched shape like the weird, thick stems of his grandmother’s jade plant come to life, writhing angrily above a swiftly-shrinking yellow bowl…

-

“Come in,” Shepard replied, to the chime at his door.  
Hillerman entered and stood at attention, his shock of stiff blond hair still damp from the shower. He was wearing a clean uniform, and he smelled… rather more like a leftover energy bar than the food currently being served in the mess hall, for which Shepard quietly blamed Kaidan.  
“At ease, Lt. What’s on your mind?”  
Hillerman took the ‘at ease’ command literally, and stood with his hands clasped loosely behind his back as he collected his thoughts. Shepard decided not to tell him again.  
“...You, sir,” Hillerman admitted, “-I wasn’t _looking_ for it before, but- -I realized why you gave me your spot on the ground team the minute I came back on board.”  
Shepard nodded once and waited, trying to ignore the way his stomach felt.  
Hillerman said nothing.  
“-So?” Shepard prompted.  
“So what happens now that you’re pregnant?” Hillerman asked, looking him in the eyes.  
“...You mean why didn’t we run for port as soon as I found out?” Shepard translated.  
“-Yeah.”  
“Okay. First things first. The _Normandy_  moves when I or Major Alenko say it does, and not before. I want us to be clear on that.”  
“Clear… sir,” Hillerman ground out, the muscle at the corner of his jaw working silently.  
“And we’re staying put for now, because the Rachni and the Krogan are personal friends of mine, and I’d rather not see them go to war over something as stupid as this.”  
“This was the Major’s mission…” Hillerman pointed out, “-and he’s not even on the ship anymore.”  
Shepard took a few quick strides across the deck, and fixed the lieutenant with a scathing look. Then he paused. Hillerman didn’t smell like dominance, he smelled like... fear. A very worried Alpha.  
Being married to Kaidan, ‘worried Alpha’ was a scent Shepard knew well, but he hadn’t expected it from this frustrating, arrogant marine.  
“Hillerman,” he began, a little less angrily than he’d been planning to.  
“Sir?”  
“If the shit hit the fan again tomorrow, I would feel safer here on the _Normandy_  with you than if I was back on the citadel.”  
“...I’m… -But you’re the Major’s...” Hillerman protested, his ears reddening.  
“Yeah,” Shepard agreed, “-and _you_  like girls. But you’re still a key part of my crew, and you’re still an Alpha. Hell, you’re my marine lieutenant, I _expect_  you to worry about protecting this ship and everyone on it. ...Just don’t forget who’s in charge here.”  
“I don’t believe this… you’re talking _me_  down… and you look like you’re gonna puke.”  
“-I might,” Shepard admitted, “...do you mind wrapping this up?”

-

“Well,” Grunt drawled, when he was sure Kaidan was awake, “-that _sucked_.”  
Kaidan blinked a few times, and put a hand to his head experimentally. It was still there, and he felt surprisingly undamaged, considering.  
“...What happened? Why was I out?”  
“Your suit’s cracked,” Grunt pointed helpfully to the damage, a bifurcated line high up on the blue breastplate near Kaidan’s right shoulder-joint, “-you blacked out in the upper atmo. Galn says he owes you one for hauling his ass inboard before that.”  
“I wouldn’t want him to leave me hanging on the outside of a shuttle door either,” Kaidan said, sitting up and looking around for his helmet.  
“...I’m gonna kill that thing…” Grunt promised himself, pounding a fist into the palm of his other hand.  
“I don’t ever want to see the Hydra again,” Kaidan admitted.  
“Hydra?”  
“There’s a creature in old Earth mythology like this, but it only had three heads, not… however many.”  
“How did they kill it?” Grunt asked, eagerly.  
“Uhhh… I remember something about a guy with a sword and a polished shield. I could look it up, if you want.”  
“ _Yeaaah..._ ”

-

“Hey, Joker.”  
“Shepard,” Joker replied, looking up and back over his shoulder, “-hey- wow, you look pretty rough…”  
Shepard shrugged, and folded his arms. He did look more like the captain of a tramp freighter than usual, and it made his last three days beard look more like negligence than art.  
“...So it’s true,” the pilot stated, carefully.  
“-That was fast,” Shepard grumbled.  
“It’s a small ship,” Joker pointed out. “-I’m really happy for you and Kaidan.”  
“Even if it means you get stuck on the beach for a while?” Shepard asked, raising an eyebrow.  
“Well-” Joker brought himself up short, “-I won’t say I’m looking forward to _that_ part, but it won’t be forever, right?” ...Unlike that last time.  
“...No,” Shepard agreed, after a pause he let go on a little too long.  
“We’ve got your back, Captain,” Joker promised him with a calm sidelong glance.

-

Red alarms, and smoke too thick to smell anything else. Pounding boots, over a deck that bucked and shuddered beneath them. Kaidan searched quickly in the haze, touched one running crewman’s shoulder as he staggered past, ducked under a low-hanging arc of detached black cable as the deck-gravity shifted again-  
“Shepard! I can’t find him, have you-” Kaidan began.  
“No!” Shepard cut him off, turning from the control panel on the bulkhead. Behind the lenses of his helmet, his eyes looked scared, “-you check engineering, I’ll see if he’s up with Joker on the bridge-”  
“We’ve got to get the crew out-” Kaidan heard himself say.  
“I KNOW!” Shepard shouted back over his shoulder angrily, “-but I’m not leaving him behind!”  
There was an explosion somewhere further down the corridor, and the dust rose-  
Kaidan woke up, trembling hard.  
He willed the glow crawling across his skin to subside, and squeezed his eyes shut when the flickering energy faded. Kaidan reached over for the band of his omnitool in the dark, and had almost finished entering the code to talk to Shepard before he realized what he was doing. He stopped and took a breath, then sighed. It was... four in the morning. Shepard didn’t get enough sleep as it was. ...But they’d been down this road before, and if _he_  didn’t call, Shepard wouldn’t call either.  
Kaidan typed in the last number of the code, and hit connect.

-

The radiation alarm in the Normandy’s airlock went off.  
The inner doors locked fast, and Shepard thunked his forehead lightly against the cool metal with a sigh. Grunt had tried to bring a bottle of Ryncol aboard, it had to be.  
“Chakwas?” He said anyway, keying the radio in his right ear.  
“I see it. I’ll be right up, Captain,” the Doctor promised.  
It wasn’t just the Ryncol, though Shepard’s instinct about the tank-bred Krogan had been right on there… it was the bandage on Kaidan’s arm. Chakwas had the two back out of the airlock, then joined them over on the Krogan ship in a medical iso-suit. Shepard leaned against the wall by the airlock monitor screen, arms folded, and tried not to think.  
Chakwas and the others returned about twenty minutes later, and this time the airlock cleared them for entry. Grunt was wearing different armor, and had lost the booze. The dust-contaminated bandage on Kaidan’s left forearm had been changed for a neater alliance-issue one, and the whole was now sealed under a layer of something thin and gray, probably lead-poly isotape…  
But they were _home_.

-

“Mh. I can’t believe I actually missed this stuff…” Shepard sighed, fishing a slice of meat out of the bowl in front of him with chopsticks and looking at it with amusement.  
“S’good for you,” Grunt told him from the depths of a much larger thresher steak noodle-bowl, “-Wrex always said you were part Krogan, Shepard.”  
Shepard snorted, chewing.  
Kaidan said nothing. He was working through his own food, and the feeling of having his arm around Shepard again, of having the man so _close_  at his side, smelling so _right_ …  
No. He wouldn’t be going back out with Grunt again, even if Shepard ordered him to. And somehow, he doubted that Shepard would ask.

-

Epilogue:

Shepard left the comm room looking dangerously pleased with himself, and headed forward. Kaidan left the railing of the star-chart in the CIC, and followed him onto the bridge.  
“So how did it go in there with Hackett?” Joker asked, demanding the probably-classified intel without hesitation.  
“Good. Since the Council’s cutting me loose, he had some new orders for us.”  
Joker looked from the slightly mad-fox expression on Shepard’s face, to the smooth, not-quite-round patch showing through the front of his t-shirt, and finally over at Kaidan to see if Shepard was serious. Kaidan looked knowing, but was of no help whatsoever.  
“Course, sir?” Joker asked either or both of them, with a sigh.  
“Take us home, Joker,” Shepard replied, laying a hand on his pilot’s shoulder.  
“-Where’s home this week?” Joker threw back with a grin.  
“Earth,” Shepard told him, at the same time Kaidan said smugly,  
“It’s already programmed in.”  
Joker called up the coordinates. Vila Militar, Rio de Janeiro, Earth. ...N-school.  
“How _did_  you do that?” Shepard demanded, softly.  
“...You’re gonna be teaching at the Interplanetary special forces school while you’re pregnant?” Joker reviewed, aloud, “-yeah, of course you are, that would make perfect sense if you’re Shepard… or just, you know, insane...”  
“James told me a week ago they were shuffling the class schedules around for the next quarter, and nobody knew who the new adjunct instructors were. I knew Hackett was too smart to leave you on the beach for another six months with nothing to do, so...” Kaidan shrugged, ignoring Joker’s aside.  
“And you didn’t tell me this until now because…?” Shepard prompted, testily.  
“Hackett can read you like a billboard,” Kaidan told him.  
“No he _can’t_.”  
“Yes he _can_ , and if we didn’t learn this from James, Hackett knows the shortlist of who else could have leaked it.”  
“...You were protecting one of the Biotics combat-instructors,” Shepard realized.  
“Yeah, I was.”  
“Who else do we-” Shepard began, speculatively.  
“-Does this mean the rest of us start out our shore leave in Rio?” Joker interrupted.  
“Absolutely,” Kaidan promised, and put his hand on Joker’s other shoulder.  
“I can work with that,” Joker decided, and opened up the first of his jump-prep screens.

\---


End file.
